11 October 2015 // Florine van Rees //Rotterdam

//DAILY

If we're thinking about multi-taskers, Lionel Wendt must be a school example. We know the artist from his unique way of taking pictures and composing them, but next to that Wendt is also known as a professional pianist, critic, literature collector and cinematographer.

"Lionel Wendt was the central figure of a cultural life torn between the death rattles of the Empire and a human appraisal of the untapped values of Ceylon." — Pablo Neruda, Memoirs.

 Wendt had a talent for beauty, which made him internationally famous as a photographer. In Ceylon, the people knew him as the great pianist. He had that rare capacity for taking infinite pains over everything he played, and his interpretations were ever models of integrity and rigidly disciplined skill.

See the world through the eyes of the Sri Lankan Lionel Wendt in the following pictures, made by his hand.